


thin line

by bystander



Category: Durarara!!
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Cynophobia, Knives, M/M, Minidura References, Smoking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-24
Updated: 2016-11-24
Packaged: 2018-09-01 23:58:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,287
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8643217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bystander/pseuds/bystander
Summary: He was the one who started this, the bastard, the asshole, the rat, how dare he try to run away when it’s entirely due to his provocation that Shizuo sees red and his fingers are shaking like an unfamiliar drug is coursing through his veins. 
Shizuo runs, and runs, and runs, because if he doesn’t get to begin this fight, he swears to a deity he doesn’t believe in that he’s going to be the one that ends it.





	

“Is that all you’ve got,” says a voice behind him, and it sounds like all the world like he was asking if Shizuo had pissed his pants the other day and his arm hadn’t just been fucking broken.

 

“What was that?” Shizuo can feel his face twisting into that expression his younger brother had told him was unpleasant—his eyes go dark, his lips stretch with a smile spilling with animosity zeroing in on his target, an ocean of blood pounds bass in his ears. He grinds his heel into the concrete as he swivels around. “I—za—ya—kun—”

 

“Oh, dear,” smiles Izaya unpleasantly. His hair is only slightly disheveled, but appears carelessly with grace in a way that makes Shizuo’s blood boil hotter than the sun. Izaya slowly brings a hand to his mouth, exaggerated with the flex of his tendons and the angle of his joints. “Oh my, is Shizu-chan getting soft?” Izaya’s eyes go bright with mania, stretching impossibly wider in amusement. Red shines from the length of his knife. “I don’t even think I’ll need to be admitted to the ICU this time.”

 

“Well, if you rea—lly want to, I can do that for you,” he says, tipping his head back for effect. Yellow brushes over his eyes; the red sun pours down light on its descent, unhurried as always. He puffs some air out the side of his mouth, harsher than is really needed to displace some stray hair—his hands clench in fists at his sides, knuckles prominent with the exertion. “It’s been a while since you showed your rat’s ass around here. You can call it a special service if you want.” The nails digging into the underside of his palm are, he is painstakingly aware, crusted with blood. “I haaaate violence, you know?”

 

He’s still looking up when Izaya says, “You know, _Shizu-chan_ ,” but no, he isn’t saying the words as much as mockingly drawing them out, “the more you say that, the less I believe you.”

 

“That’s _all_ I want, really,” Shizuo says, sarcasm biting. The cigarette he’d crushed with the sole of his foot when this farce began is still smoldering in the corner of his vision. “A flea like you to listen to me.” And then his neck twists to right himself, he cracks his fingers, and says, his voice rumbling over the words, “Get the fuck outta Ikebukuro.”

 

Izaya is, forevermore, with that abhorrent look on his face. He’s violently amused, distantly analytical, eyes dyed bloody as if to give hint to what he’s seen, what he’s capable of.

 

And despite that.

 

_His arm’s bending the wrong way,_ Shizuo thinks with vicious vindication. He’d heard the clean snap of it. Red is staining the fur of Izaya’s cuffs. _He’s not gonna be wearing that anymore._

 

Shizuo takes a step forward, filled with resolve, propelled by years of want of—what, exactly? He wants Orihara Izaya to be dead. The fact is indisputable. But he’d never put much thought to the actual process—the other was just suddenly gone and out of his life. He still isn’t sure how this is going to play out, now, when he’s close enough he could just reach over and deliver a crushing fist through the other’s gut.

 

But he was never one for details. Shizuo’s bloodstream is full to bursting of adrenaline, and he’s choking for the sheer, tangible weight of it in his entire body.

 

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you wanted to break my limbs so I couldn’t leave, and just die here,” Izaya sing-songs. He’s glowing radiation bright. “As much as I’d just love to do that for you—”

 

“I’m going to kill you,” Shizuo growls. His heart is beating so erratically he wouldn’t be surprised if it just exploded from the strain. “And then you’ll be _gone_.”

 

Izaya tuts, clicking his tongue. “You’re an awful conversationalist. We’re not going to get anywhere just by you threatening me. You’re just as dull as you ever were.”

 

“You’re right,” says Shizuo, in rare agreement, suddenly calm. Izaya blinks, and Shizuo’s throttling forward and Izaya dips under the arc of brick-breaking force, through it, and now Shizuo’s the one at the cornered in the alley (although as if _Heiwajima Shizuo_ could be _cornered_ ) and Izaya with his back to the dim lights of the waking streetlights and the orange red of the setting sun.

 

“I’ve had enough for today,” announces Izaya, twirling his knife artfully through his fingers, as if getting attacked with murderous intent of Ikebukuro’s monster is a recreational pastime he can start and stop at will, like the mere sight of Shizuo doesn’t send hardened criminals begging god for forgiveness. Izaya tilts his head. “You win the city for now,” Izaya says, as if he’s conceding, as if the goddamned bastard had just been toying with Shizuo this entire fucking time. 

 

Days, weeks, months, years.

 

Shizuo narrows his eyes, and before he can even open his mouth to retort, Izaya is sprinting out the alley, turns a corner, is out of sight.

 

 

 

 

 

“Don’t smoke, Shizuo,” his mother had told him, looking disdainfully at the smoke curling above the city streets. He’s accompanying his mother grocery-shopping, and his arms are, inexplicably, not weighted down by the plastic bags filled to the brim despite having carried it for an hour now.

 

“Why not,” says Shizuo, six years old and always having been fascinated by the evanescent tendrils that snaked out of his grandmother’s mouth.

 

“It’s an awful habit,” his mother says, derisive. She nods behind them. “Careful not to inhale any.”

 

“But why?” Shizuo insists. He does as his mother told, taking his unburdened arm and holding it over his nose. 

 

Naoko looks down at Shizuo, in his long sleeved shirt just a little too long, the one she knows he’ll grow into sooner rather than later, and smiles. “It’s going to ruin your liver, dear. And you could get lung cancer. You come from a long line of smokers, so it’s important that you don’t start either, okay?”

 

And she looks off, abruptly, into the incoming stoplight, and Shizuo wouldn’t realize until nearly a decade later that the emotion that colored her face was regret.

 

 

 

 

 

Celty is a nice reprieve. She listens, and offers easy conversation, gives kindness as easily as anything. She is Shizuo’s best friend, and Shizuo sinks into her companionship like a dead weight in water.

 

_Shinra keeps trying to make me wear a sailor uniform,_ she types, exasperated but fond. _Do you think this is a weird fetish or something??_

 

Shizuo hums, the sound comfortingly rumbling in his chest. “I think it’s less than the uniform and more of you.”

 

Black smoke spurts out of Celty’s neck aggressively, flustered, still be overwhelmed by Shinra’s audacity after all these years.

 

All these years, Shizuo thinks, a little melancholy. It’s been a while, hasn’t it.

 

And Shizuo has a soft smile on his face, watching Celty fumble around to press into her keyboard, until she flips it around for him to see and it reads, _Enough about me! What have you been up to recently?_

 

Shizuo shuts his eyes, breathes in. He reclines the back of his neck on the park bench, surprisingly without splinters. “That fucking bastard keeps coming to this goddamn city,” says Shizuo, voice steady. “I don’t know why he doesn’t just stay in Shinjuku.”

 

Celty doesn’t like Izaya. Doesn’t like the way he treats people, doesn’t like his general personality, isn’t exactly thrilled that he and Shinra are something that can be called friends. But she’s fair, and isn’t as close-minded as Shizuo is, and types, _Well. Wasn’t this his city? He did attend Raira, after all. I wonder why he moved._

 

“It doesn’t matter why he moved,” says Shizuo gruffly. “All that matters is he’s _gone_.”

 

Celty’s neck tilts. _Is he though?,_ she types in consideration. _Is he really?_

 

Shizuo thinks of Ikebukuro, every nook and cranny Izaya’s stuck his fingers in, the gangs, the yakuza, the misled citizens, Russia sushi, Raira, Shinra, every unusual incident, the way his name is a whisper constantly ghosting its way about the city.

 

Shizuo sighs. “No,” he says, voice heavy and bitter. “No. He isn’t.”

 

_Then why did he leave?_

 

So he wouldn’t get half-killed every time he so much as breathed, thinks Shizuo, but even as the idea forms to words Shizuo finds he’s dissatisfied with the answer.

 

 

 

 

“Isn’t that great,” the boy says gleefully. “I’ve found one. A monster. Isn’t this just grand!”

 

“Who the fuck are you calling a monster,” Shizuo glares, his grip in his palm crushing necks and electric poles. Could crush the world, if he wanted it to.

 

He never wanted it to.

 

This boy, fresh out of middle school and more manic than a single person had any right to be, spills loud, grating laughter, weightless airiness in his lungs. He could rise up and fly with that voice. “You, of course, Heiwajima Shizuo,” says the boy, red-eyed and malicious. “As if somebody who could lift up electric poles could be human.”

 

“How the fuck do you know my name,” says Shizuo, and this is odd, he has never in his life been this enraged before. Every cell in his body is screaming at him to go on a rampage, to rip up the boy with the red eyes and black hair with a smirk that said, quite clearly, that there was nothing in the world that could make him fear.

 

The boy shakes his head in mock disappointment. “Well, Shizuo—can I call you Shizuo?”

 

Shizuo growls in response, deep and feral, and the noise urges pigeons to panic. A whole drove of them flock away from the top of the one-story building the boy is standing.’

 

The boy stands there, unconcerned by the great gust of wind the pigeons had caused, his hair and jacket swirling around from the air pressure. Feathers jolted off by the frantic beating of wings slowly flutter down, and the boy pushes his bangs out of his eyes with slender fingers.

 

“Shizu-chan, then,” he says, red ruby eyes glinting, and before Shizuo can chuck another trash can at him, he says, “How rude of you. Shinra said he was going to introduce a friend from middle school, didn’t he? You rip up a soccer field and its inhabitants, and the first thing you say when you see me is that you hate me. Real charmer, you are. Tell me, have you got a girlfriend?”

 

Shizuo is looking around for the nearest projectile he can throw, and the boy continues on as if he doesn’t notice. Or rather, doesn’t care. “Of course you don’t. Monsters finding love would be a real sight. Tell me if you do so I can laugh at you.”

 

He neatly dodges a railing and looks more delighted. “Oh, these are nailed down, aren’t they? Monster, indeed. God might actually exist if there are monsters in this world.”  


Shizuo forcefully upends anything he can find, a bicycle, a street sign, a sewer grate. “Who the fuck cares about _god._ ”

 

The boy dodges the public property deftly, almost like a dance. His eyes glow. “But wouldn’t you want to know,” he lilts, “if there was life after death?” And then a knife embeds itself into Shizuo’s side, and Shizuo starts bleeding, and the bastard disappears down the side of the building and sprints away. 

 

He was the one who started this, the _bastard,_ the _asshole_ , the _rat_ , how _dare_ he try to run away when it’s entirely due to his provocation that Shizuo sees red and his fingers are shaking like an unfamiliar drug is coursing through his veins. 

 

Shizuo runs, and runs, and runs, because if he doesn’t get to begin this fight, he swears to a deity he doesn’t believe in that he’s going to be the one that ends it.

 

 

 

 

 

“Shinra,” says Shizuo through gritted teeth. “How did you become friends with the damn flea anyway?”

 

Shinra hums as he wraps the flesh where blood is filtering through the gash on Shizuo’s back. “The normal way, I guess,” says Shinra, not especially concerned. “I wanted to start a club so Celty would be happy I had more friends, and Izaya-kun became a member.”

 

“And that’s it?” Shizuo frowns. “You were just in the same club as each other? Isn’t it weird that he actually likes you?”

 

“He just comes to visit sometimes. And I met you in elementary, you know,” Shinra says, tying the bandage into a decisive knot. “Celty likes you, and you get injured often enough that I see you at least biweekly.” Shinra nods at his handiwork, and then makes a small ‘ah’ in realization. “Right,” he says. “I don’t suppose he’s still hung up about that time he got me stabbed?”

 

“ _What?_ ” Shizuo roars, getting up. Shinra watches him bemusedly. “That bastard! I’ll kill him!”

 

Now this was too far. Blood is rushing in his ears, and he knew Izaya was scum but stabbing _Shinra_ of all people was just too low. He can already feel the scorch of righteous anger curling in his fist. 

 

“Huh,” says Shinra. He shrugs. “I guess the nuance is off.”

 

_Calm down, Shizuo!_ types Celty reassuringly. _Some other guy did it, and Izaya took the blame. Although,_ and Celty starts pounding her keyboard with more force, _it was his fault in the first place._

 

“I’ll kill him for you, Shinra,” says Shizuo resolutely.

 

Shinra just smiles his usual smile. “Do whatever you want, Shizuo. Though I only have so many friends, see. It’d be unfortunate if I lost one.”

 

 

 

 

 

The thing about Orihara Izaya was that it was near impossible to see him as a person. In Shizuo’s mind, he was personified as a blanket of malice, omniscient and forever seeping through where you didn’t want him. More of a concept, than anything.

 

And that was exactly why he couldn’t reconcile the person in front of him, hanging on to an electric pole with all four limbs like a monkey. He has an uncomfortable look on his face, though, to Izaya’s credit, he does somehow manage to start smirking again when he sees Shizuo approach.

 

“What the fuck are you doing,” says Shizuo with all his characteristic tact. He almost instinctively reaches into his back pocket for his phone and snaps a picture of Izaya, who inexplicably, somehow senses the incoming camera and schools his face into something that could possibly be considered pleasant-looking if it weren’t for the fact that his mere existence was a cancer upon the earth.

 

Izaya’s smirk drops abruptly when Shizuo moves to pocket his phone. He removes an arm keeping his grip on the pole, places it over his face, and sighs through his nose. “What do you want, Shizu-chan.”

 

“Don’t call me that,” Shizuo replies automatically. And then, it occurs to him that he has no idea how he should be reacting to this.

 

Izaya, the culmination of all bad things, who had probably wrecked countless lives despite being a second year in high school, is hanging halfway up an electric pole. Bested by some _dogs_ at the foot of it.

 

The hilarity hits him, and Shizuo starts laughing, and Izaya is looking increasingly unamused.

 

“Right. Laugh, you protozoan,” says Izaya. He grimaces, scoots a touch higher on the pole. “Now could you get rid of these damn dogs.”

 

Shizuo does no such thing. He bends down to them, and grabs a dog, brown and wide-eyed, and starts ruffling their hair. 

 

The dog barks in pleasure, curly tail wagging, and leans into his touch; the five other dogs starts surrounding him with wanting of the same.

 

Izaya mutters something under his breath; for once, Shizuo doesn’t mind, because this is possibly the best day in his entire life.

 

In no time at all, he realizes, he’s been playing with the dogs for two hours. When he looks up, the figure dangling for dear life is gone. And, Shizuo notes sourly, as is his phone.

 

 

 

 

 

“Good work today, Shizuo,” says Tom-san. “Sales today were pretty good.” He stacks the discarded banana boxes on top of each other.

 

Shizuo nods emphatically. “Tom-san! What do you think about doing takoyaki or cotton candy next year!” He jolts. “Those little things that go round and round…”

 

Tom-san looks at him. “…You really had fun, didn’t you?”

 

“Yeah!” says Shizuo. “But…” The vein in Shizuo’s temple begins to throb. “If only that fucking flea didn’t come. He made me waste bananas, too.” He finishes untying his work apron and folds it aggressively, thwacking the fabric onto the shop counter.

 

“Ah, no, wasn’t he the one that organized the festival in the first place?” says Tom idly; then the implication of what he just said catches up with him and he sighs.

 

“ _What do you mean, Tom-san?”_ Shizuo says; and Shizuo does this every time when someone mentions Izaya and suspicious activity, almost instantaneously: his eyes flare, clouding with a familiar red, his fists clamp into homicidal tension, and—dammit, the bastard must have planned _something, what other reason would he have, Shizuo is going to tear him limb from fucking limb—_

 

“Shizuo,” says Tom-san, raising his palms in a placating gesture. “I just heard it from some passerby, the admin apparently said so on that Dollars site. Look, the festival’s over, and nothing too drastic has happened, right?”

 

“But _why_ ,” Shizuo grits, grip still trembling with anticipatory violence; it’s even easier to get worked up when the flea’s stench hung like smoke around their area, as was wont anywhere the damn shit went, even hours later; and a whirlwind of imaginings flash through his head, blurry outlines of the city enshrouded in a gang war, yakuza getting involved, set the city on fire, countless lives ruined, and call him excessive, but its not like the bastard hasn’t done it _before—_

 

“Shizuo,” repeats Tom-san, kind but firm. “The festival is over. Nothing’s happened. And you even had a good time. It wasn’t bad, right?”

 

Shizuo takes a deep breath, counts to ten. His fingers slide off from the vice-like grip he had on the fabric of his bartender uniform’s collar. “I guess you’re right,” Shizuo says reluctantly. He gets hold of one of the remaining choco-bananas and chomps a bite. “Sorry, Tom-san,” he says sincerely. “Let’s continue cleaning up.”

 

Tom-san waves him off. “I can do the rest. There isn’t that much anyway.” And he’s right. They’d already dismantled the storefront, and packaged away the vat of remaining chocolate and crates of bananas; there was only general cleanup left.

 

“Then, thank you,” Shizuo says, inclining his head, extracting a smoke from his breast pocket. “I’ll just be walking around to see what’s still open. I’m getting something for dinner at one of the stalls, so call me if you need anything.”

 

Tom-san starts rolling up the shop sign. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll be fine.” He smiles. “Have fun!”

 

 

 

 

 

And that _was_ the plan. Shizuo had even picked out a nice festival food to eat, a takoyaki stand with a respectable queue that smelled delicious.

 

And then he catches wind of a pungent odor he’d recognize from the other side of the world, burnt lavender and black pepper and aloe vera, too many too overbearing scents to be packed into one person, as unreasonable as it was possible to be. The disgusting combination burns his nose and blockades itself there, as if daring anything to kick it out, stronger than even the usual constant attention-seeking of the other’s remnants of presence.

 

Immediately, Shizuo vaults out of his place in line and toward the source, passerby scattering out of the way when they catch sight of Heiwajima Shizuo, At It Again.

 

“ _II—ZAA—YA—KUN—_ ”

 

And the shit is only a two minute run away; Shizuo barely registers the sign pronouncing the shopfront as a drinking establishment before he tears into the shop and already has a stool lifted up to smash onto the other’s head.

 

And then he pauses. Whatever Shizuo had fleetingly expected Izaya to be doing, whether it be having shady business dealings or corrupting young children or whatever the bastard did for fun—this was not it. 

 

Izaya is not surprised when he notices Shizuo’s presence. Izaya indeed ostensibly has a serving of nabe in front of him, and his signature jacket fit on his shoulders.

 

What Shizuo does not expect is the man on Izaya’s lap, or the three bottles of vodka around them, or that Izaya’s mouth is bruised for a reason most likely not from a blow.

 

Shizuo reflexively hurls the chair at Izaya, on pure principle. The man crashes to the ground as he dodges the projectile, and Izaya evades by ducking. The chair clatters to the floor, leaving a sizable dent through the flooring.

 

“Ah, Shizu-chan,” says Izaya. He smooths out his slightly disheveled hair, gaze biting. “What brings you here?”

 

Shizuo shakes off his earlier confusion. “What were you planning, with the festival and everything, you asshole? Why the fuck are you _still_ in Ikebukuro?”

 

Izaya’s smirk doesn’t slip, but his eyebrows draw tight as he replies. “No reason,” says Izaya. He lifts a shot glass from the bar counter, brings it to his lips. “Just because I wanted to. You were all in the palm of my hand, damn it.”

 

Shizuo blinks. This is slightly out of character from what he knows of Izaya. His expressions are usually indecipherable, fixed in a permanent sneer. And he certainly never got upset enough to swear. 

 

Shizuo steps forward. Izaya in turn steps back, but with a slight, infinitesimal tumble to his usual finesse. 

 

Shizuo takes another step forward, and is filled with sudden understanding when he takes note of the splash of red across the other’s usual bloodless cheeks and the slight glaze in his eyes.

 

Izaya’s lashes flutter half-closed. He abruptly clicks his tongue, a resounding crack about the silent bar, the other patrons watching their exchange with apprehension. 

 

“Figures the only time I get drunk in years Shizu-chan finds me,” he murmurs, then draws his back straight. “What now, Shizu-chan?” says Izaya, no audible slur to his words. The dim lighting catches at his black hair. “Would you like to chase me around the city again?”

 

The idea certainly seems inviting. The flea isn’t completely sober, which gives Shizuo an extra edge in finally catching Izaya once and for all.

 

But then his stomach rumbles, and Shizuo remembers he hasn’t eaten since lunch nearly six hours ago, and that he’d gotten up at six to set up the chocolate banana stand. And, Shizuo convinces himself, it wasn’t like Izaya could plot some evil elaborate plan when he was tipsy, in any case. He eyes the man still on the floor. The flea could probably keep himself busy for a little bit.

 

So he breathes through his nose, thinks regretfully about the possibility behind eggplants, apologizes to the frightened bartender for the trouble, and exits. He does not register the shock that flits through Izaya’s face.

 

Shizuo strolls back to the takoyaki stand. He orders two boxes of the stuff, hands over the money, and finds a park bench to sit on. Placing the box he was planning on eating first on his lap and the other next to him, he breaks apart his disposable chopsticks. Joining his hands together, he mumbles a quick “thanks for the food” and stabs a chopstick through his first octopus ball.

 

Shizuo lets his gaze rise to the dusky sky as he eats. As he savors the taste of his meal, a single thought replays in his mind. 

 

Despite not letting his anger get the best of him for once, somehow, it doesn’t feel as satisfying as he had expected it would.

 

 

 

 

 

Shizuo’s not. Shizuo’s not _scared_ , or anything. He isn’t nervous. He’s broken buildings and bones. He’s broken things he hadn’t known _could_ be broken. But he’s being absolutely irresponsible. For something other than the usual gratuitous violence.

 

“Just,” says Shizuo, and he’s panicking, a little, though any evidence is in the confines of his pulse. Nobody has to know. “Give me the cheapest pack.”

 

The little man sitting at the counter squints at him. He’s a broad man, probably in his forties, probably the owner of this tiny mom and pop he’d found in one of the quieter areas in town. His handlebar mustache twitches, and the newspaper he’s holding shifts as he lowers it to get a better look at Shizuo.

 

“Are you sure?” The man settles on his plastic stool, finally putting down the newspaper. He rests a chin on his hand, gives Shizuo an appraising look.

 

_An Urban Legend? Witnesses Report Blond Man in Bartender Suit Throwing Vending Machines, Injuring Two! Testimonies On Page 24._

 

Shizuo swallows, and his spit goes down with the force of an anvil. “Yeah.”

 

The man clicks his tongue. “Show me your ID. You look kind of young.”

 

That’s. To be expected. He’d just turned 20 last week. 

 

So he buys a small pack of cancer sticks, remembers to ask for a lighter because certainly nobody in his family has any he could borrow; and, he tells himself, he inhales so much second-hand smoke from his kind of job that going a step further really shouldn’t be a concern.

 

He shuts his eyes, removes a stick from the pack, seal thrown resolutely in the trash can outside the small store, and.

 

His fingers brace heavy on the stick. He lifts the lighter. Burns the end of the cigarette. The thing snaps in half. Tobacco spills to the ground slowly, almost like snowflakes.


End file.
